Social Exchange and Cooperation

1. Social Exchange and Cooperation Chapter 9

2. Chapter Outline The evolution of human social behavior and formation of social and economic structures The expression of social behavior across diverse settings, in experiments, and in game scenarios

3. What is social exchange and cooperation? Way in which humans primarily interact with one another to meet and optimize their well-being

4. Basic model of social exchange under situational conditions

5. Evolution and social exchange • Basic needs driving early social exchange • Protection and self-defense from predators • Resource sharing • Still alive in contemporary social exchange • Humans are equipped to cooperate • Cooperation is an effective strategy: benefits from trading things of value

6. Utilitarianism and social exchange • Theorized by John Stuart Mill • Decisions and behaviors are guided by whether happiness is increased or decreased • Key factor in human exchange • People make rational calculations to maximize their return of value

7. Homans’s elementary forms of social behavior • No matter the size of the social exchange structure, its elementary forms lie in the basics of social behavior • Places importance on both field and experimental research • Overlooks the role of irrational behavior

8. Emotion and social exchange • Emotions play a role in the outcomes of social exchanges • Factors affect the exchange context, exchange process, and exchange outcomes • Internal emotions are not always fully expressed outwardly • Displayed emotions are based on social norms • Release of emotions controlled by cognition

9. Experiments involving social exchange • Kollock (1994) • Test of commitment and trust in undergrad students • Students were given role as either buyer or seller, with some buyers knowing the quality of the good before purchase and some knowing the quality after purchase • Conditions of uncertainty were associated with greater commitment and trust of a buyer to a seller

10. Experiments involving social exchange • Molm, Takabashi, and Peterson (2000) • Test of negotiated versus reciprocal exchanges • Reciprocal: individual provides goods without knowing what they will receive in return • Negotiated: predetermined trade agreements • Trust and behavioral commitment in the partner was greater in reciprocal exchange conditions

11. Reciprocity • Strong Reciprocity • Why humans cooperate with others even though there is no relatedness or obvious short-term gain • Evolved sense of sociality • Evolved sense of fairness

12. Fairness • Humans act on principles of fairness • Welfare programs: 70% of Americans did not think welfare was fair to working people, whereas fewer Americans were concerned about the costs • Free riders: Cooperators will punish or penalize free riders even if there is no direct material gain

13. Social neuroscience of exchange and cooperation • Impact of oxytocin • Released during pair-bonding activities • Helps facilitate trust among humans during social interaction • Use of brain imaging • Study 1: Mutual cooperation during an experimental game was correlated with areas of the brain that involve rewards • Study 2: Participants who cooperated had greater activation in regions that theoretically serve to delay reward, thus facilitating cooperative decisions

14. Power • Power differential among social exchanges • Control of limited resources creates leverage • Molm (1990) found that structural power has direct effects on social exchange outcomes • Strategies to deal with power differentials • Obtain a resource the power holder does not have • Find alternative sources of the resource • Get along without the resource • Attempt to force the power holder to give you the resource

15. Altruism • Behavior benefitting another organism while being detrimental to the organism performing the behavior • e.g. jumping into a river to save a drowning stranger • Benefits the long-term self-interest of organisms • Altruistic outweighs nonaltruistic behavior in long run • Humans rely on one another and are mutually interdependent • Immense opportunities to choose between altruistic or free-riding actions

16. Types of Altruism • Real Altruism • Behavior where there is no premeditated calculation of what might be received if altruistic behavior is initiated • Calculated Altruism • Premeditated calculation about receiving a benefit for altruistic behavior

17. Altruism and Cheating • “Cheaters” • Exploiters of altruistic behavior by nonaltruists without any consequence to the nonaltruists • Gross Cheating • Failure to give anything at all in return • Subtle Cheating • Always giving less than what was given

18. Possible Outcomes of Exchange Involving Real and Calculated Altruism and Gross and Subtle Cheating in Reciprocity* *Adapted from Trivers (1971).

19. Strong Reciprocity and Altruism • Tendency to cooperate with strangers and punish cheaters, even at a personal cost • Impact of strong reciprocity • Predicate moral sentiments of contemporary people valuing freedom and equality • Possession of trait allows one to contribute to group survival in dire times, even if a minority • In dire times, groups whose members possess the trait will outperform groups low on strong reciprocity.

20. Charitable Giving and Altruism • Why do people donate to charities? • Positive feelings experienced when donating • Discomfort of saying no due to social pressures • Cognitive neuroscience of charitable giving • Experiments showed that there is a neural basis for charitable donations • Areas of the brain that mediate social bonding and aversion are activated in altruistic decision making

21. Race and Altruism • May serve as possible moderators of altruistic behavior • Giver in exchange may be influenced by bigoted viewpoints • Study in post-apartheid South Africa revealed insider bias based on participant surnames

22. Self-Report Measures of Altruism • Few attempts to provide a scale of altruism • 1981 study assessed altruistic personality • Questioned: giving blood, giving directions to strangers, volunteer work, etc. • Findings correlated with other scales of moral judgment, empathy, and prosocial values

23. Emotion and Altruism • Perspective taking • The ability to get into other person’s shoes and sense their viewpoints, needs, and distress • Types of empathy • Sympathetic concern • One feels the other’s state of need and tries to make things better (impulse driven) • Cognitive empathy • Appraisal of what caused the other person’s emotional state and thoughts about amelioration (rationally driven)

24. Game Theory • Objective • Uncover reasons why people make decisions, whether they are seemingly rational or irrational • Basic theory • Everyone’s lives involve interactions with others, with strategies and decisions that can be modeled using games • Outcomes are based on the combined behavior of multiple individuals

25. Prisoner’s Dilemma • Purpose • To achieve best possible outcome for oneself in a difficult situation • Set-up • Two bank robbers are questioned separately • If a robber pleads guilty and rats out his accomplice, he will go free and his accomplice will get 30 years in prison. • If a both robbers plead guilty and rat each other out, they will both receive 10 years in prison. • If both keep quiet, they will both get 1 year • Uses • Interactions between nations involving decisions of war and peace, trade and economics, etc.

26. Exchange and cooperation over the life course Fetal environment and infancy Childhood and adolescence Adulthood

27. Fetal Environment and Infancy • Biosocial development starts at an early age • Individual variations in temperament • Indicates likely variation in altruistic and cooperation behaviors at later ages • Impact of parenting on moderating behavioral tendencies

28. Childhood and Adolescence • Learning cooperation • Play with other children: involves sharing • Observational learning: watching family members cooperate with each other • Developing sense of fair play and equality • Increased willingness to share between 3- to 4-year-olds (9%) and 7- to 8-year-olds (45%) • Continues to solidify through adolescence • Greater importance on exchanges with peers during adolescence

29. Adulthood • Continued impact of prosocial behaviors • Dependence on cooperation with others and developed functional skills for social exchange • Influenced by level of agreeableness • Measured by Five Factor Model of Personality model • High Agreeableness: getting along with others, caring about others, and acceptance • Low Agreeableness: distrust, impatience, and aggression

30. Main Points Social exchange and cooperation is rooted in the evolution of social behavior. Cooperation among early humans was driven by the need for protection and resource sharing. Emotions play a role in social exchanges. Humans have a developed sense of fairness and are willing to penalize others without obvious self-gain. Control of limited resources involves leveraging power, adding competition, cooperation, and conflict to social exchanges. Altruistic behavior outweighs nonaltruistic behavior in the long run.